Alfonso XI (
Salamanca,
August 13,
1311 – March 26/27, 1350 in
Gibraltar) was the king of
Castile,
León and
Galicia the son of
Ferdinand IV of Castile and his wife
Constance of Portugal.
He is variously known among Castilian kings as the Avenger or the Implacable, and as "He of Salado River." The first two names he earned by the ferocity with which he repressed the disorder of the nobles after a long minority; the third by his victory in the
Battle of Rio Salado over the last formidable
Marinid invasion of
Iberian Peninsula in 1340.
Alfonso XI never went to the insane lengths of his son
Pedro of Castile, but he could be bloody in his methods. He killed for reasons of state without form of trial. He openly neglected his wife,
Maria of Portugal, and had an ostentatious passion for
Eleanor of Guzman, who bore him ten children. This set Peter an example which he failed to better. It may be that his early death, during the Great Plague of 1350, at the
Siege of Gibraltar, only averted a desperate struggle with Peter, though it was a misfortune in that it removed a ruler of eminent capacity, who understood his subjects well enough not to go too far.
Marriage and children
Alfonso XI first married Costanza Manuel of Castile on 1325, but divorced her two years later. His second marriage, on 1328, was to
Maria of Portugal, daughter of
Alfonso IV of Portugal.
They had;
By his mistress,
Eleanor of Guzman, he had ten children:
- Sancho, 1st Lord of Ledesma (1331 - 1343)
After Alfonso's death, his widow Maria had Eleanor arrested and later killed.
